©2026 Lisa Maraventano. All rights reserved.
The Pawn Shop
of
Cosmic Redemption
Lisa Maraventano
Other works by Lisa Maraventano
The Remarkable Adventures of Adam de Mattos
Whiter Than Snow
Life Left
Sonny Boy
Living Memory—Poems from Rome
Shifting Sands—Poems from the Delta
Entropy Volume One
Entropy Volume Two
Cards
As Veronica Goddard
CLAIM
Walk
See
Light
Slide
Contents
Yazoo
1. This really happened
2. We were happy
3. Message in a bottle
4. House of Cards
5. Mary
6. Waking up
7. The Last Poem
8. Imperfect Haiku
9. Wine Haiku
10. Secrets
11. Yeoman’s Work
12. And so it goes
13. In Exile
14. The third of September
15. Be Kind, Rewind
16. I am at Hambone
17. Tune
18. This Old Place
19. A fist down his throat
20. Choose your own adventure
Second Street
21. Kiss the sky
22. October Mourning
23. Raised on lies
24. The Stroke of Midnight
25. Time to let go?
26. Origin Story
27. The edge of achievement
28. Trauma Bond
29. Shack Up Inn, October
30. We lit the smoke
31. The boy discovers
32. Music is sound organized through time
33. Standing Waves
34. I went to Seville
35. Pain is my master
36. I make men hard
37. Far Away Eyes
38. Punching bag
39. Gold Bars
40. Peace at the Brewery
41. Croce di Malta
42. The Monkey Fell
Delta
43. Delta is the symbol of change
44. Once
45. Lust
46. Haiku
47. David and Goliath
48. And then this happened…
49. The Devil’s Music
50. The Demon
51. A peace settles over the land
52. Appetite of Self-Destruction
53. Stream of Consciousness
54. Envy
55. Everything
56. Sloth
57. Gotta remember it’s a joke
58. Be Not Afraid
59. Haiku—Wise words from a father
Yazoo
1. This really happened
It came in a whirlwind
Some summer storm
And landed on the power line
Right outside my bedroom
A snakeskin
Draped over the wire
Shimmering silver, scaly
What could this mean?
I asked myself, and the
Internet
which said
Transformation and
Wellness
Oh, that sounds good, I thought
That’s just what I need
But I didn’t know
Exactly what shedding my old skin
Felt like, until scale by scale
The old form removed
And the transformation occurred
Now that snakeskin
Is literally moving on down the line
I don’t know how, or why
Probably the wind
But maybe some universal magic
Telling me
Girl, you did it
You were brave,
You shed that layer.
I look out my bedroom window
Each morning, every one
A miracle of light
See where the snakeskin is,
See if it is still out there
Or if this season has passed
And I can settle in
To my new skin
2. We were happy
We didn’t know we were happy, of course
Because humans are like that
But we were happy
Drinking wine on the front porch as
The sun went behind the trees, evening
Came on, night fell
We found things to bitch about
From lovers to politics to mosquitoes
But our glasses were full
And we were happy
We were happy back then,
That first day of summer
When you kids would hold hands
To make that first leap into the pool
The green mountain watching us
Love everywhere
But the days passed
And times changed, and
We changed
People got sick, got jobs, got married
This is what happens too
Because humans are like that
Looking at what is next instead of what is
And the mirage of happiness
Always remains distant, somewhere
Down the road, or a fading memory
We don’t know how to hold on to it
Even when we are in the thick of it
Even when we are surrounded by it
All the beautiful moments
Times we are happy
Someone I love once told me
“I don’t believe in happiness.”
I couldn’t understand what he meant.
But maybe now I know
The illusion is as real as it will ever be
And if you need to hold onto something
To believe in it
You can never be happy
3. Message in a bottle
I knew I would find it
In the bottom of a bottle
The message
Or at least some genie
that would make my wishes come true.
I kept looking
Opening one after the other
Getting to the bottom—
Nothing there.
But I kept trying,
Like buying lotto tickets
Like digging through cereal
Or Cracker Jack boxes
Looking for the prize
Where the fuck is it?
The message, the genie
The truth, the answer
She’s in there somewhere
It is May 28
In Arizona
Just swam naked in the pool
Drinking again, listening to music
Smoking cigarettes
And I know the answer
Is in the bottom of this bottle
The message that says
Yes
This is all there is, my friend
Sun and water
Booze and cigarettes
Music and love
This is it
And for real I put a message
In a bottle once
My college graduation
And threw it into the Pacific Ocean
At some beach in Santa Cruz
What did it say?
Probably this
Probably
Don’t take it too seriously
Don’t take any of it too fucking seriously
Enjoy the ride, my friends
Skinny dip and sunburn
Turn on Fleetwood Mac or AC/DC
Find some peace this summer day
Don’t let the bastards grind you down
Don’t let the grind bastard you into nothing
4. House of Cards
I knocked mine down
Took an ace, folded it in half
Got a sleeping bag and a pack of cigarettes
Camped out
I spent some time yesterday with people
Still building their houses
People who still believe
You need to reach the sky
I got nothing to say to them
We all have to learn on our own
And maybe their houses of cards
Satisfy them in a way mine never did
But I’m an earth sign, Virgo
Need to stay grounded
Free from the madness
Of HOA’s, taxes, insurance
Gaming the system to stay ahead
Trying to hold back the wind
That wants to knock down your house
That wants to steal your cards away
While you spend your days
Holding your house together
And maybe that’s the best way for some people
Maybe it would have been better for me
To keep everything propped up,
Spend my time putting cards here and there
To not quit the game
And see what else there is
5. Mary
Thanks for coming here, Mary
I learned a lot from you
I learned I am okay as is,
as I am
As I once theorized
All of us are
Fucked up beautiful messes
Trying our best to enjoy the ride
Vaguely toxic
Severely flawed
And I love that
I love that so much
Human
Human, and divine
6. Waking up
It’s fun out there in the astral chaos
But I usually like waking up too
Dropping back in to this life
I sleep with my curtains open
So I wake to see the sun rise over my garden
But today feels like everything is broken
All hope is lost
And I can’t even stand to think those words
Hope must be found
Through search and rescue
Parties
And so I turn
To the one thing I’ve found hope in
In this earthly realm
Clack clack clack go the keys
Simulating a typewriter
Here on this phone
Thanks, Apple
That the sound of keystrokes
Still exists
I know Jesus has got me
I know the Lord knows my story
And realized I am the Lord’s story
So there is nothing to fear,
No need to worry
But back in human form
In the blue chair in the kitchen
On a cloudy morning in July
It is the writing
The writing
Which translates the chaos
Of the world into something
I, and hopefully you, can understand
7. The Last Poem
And here is all
The words have left
And that’s okay, I am
Not a poet anyway
The story unfolds
In this netted mind
Woven with tales and
Time, experience,
Thousands of books,
The minds of the greats inside mine
And maybe my mind isn’t so great
Anymore, and maybe I think too much
The accusation made, and I
Should eat and move like an animal
Like you, my love
But as you said
We are on different paths
And so this is the last poem
You are in
I will write a new story.
8. Imperfect Haiku
Life is Beautiful
The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly
La Dolce Vita
I’m sitting here
In my blue chair in the kitchen—
I painted this chair
One morning, talking to
My daughter on the phone
It was an ugly chair left here
When I moved into my place
in Clarksdale
I picked out the paint
At Sherwin Williams, two blocks away
And tried
Brushstroke by brushstroke
To improve life a little,
Make it beautiful—
So I’m sitting in this chair
After laboring eight hours today
With a glass of wine and you
Trying to make sense of it all
All these days I’ve lived
And the three movie titles
Came to mind, regardless of their content
An imperfect haiku.
My ikebana teacher in Hawaii
Karen would compliment a piece
Saying, “it’s very Japanese.”
And this isn’t. It is
Imperfect
And that is what I’ve discovered
All those moments, days, years
Lived were indeed imperfect
But they became
Beautiful
Like my chair
And the sweet life is simply
A dip in the water
9. Wine Haiku
Open the bottle
All the problems disappear
Until tomorrow
10. Secrets
It is early morning and
I want to go through a box of old letters
No one knows I have
Therefore they are secrets
The forgotten writings from years ago
I could chuck all of them into the trash
Unread
Dispose of all these secrets
Unexamined
Maybe that would be best, for the best
Not to revisit past lives, past moments
But I wasn’t made that way
I am the repository for secrets
You wouldn’t believe what happens
When I tell people I’m a writer
(And other writers get this too)
People I’ve just met
Tell me their stories, their secrets
As if hoping I will use them
Bring them out into the world
For examination, contemplation
This fascinates me
How the locked away secrets and stories
Pour out of people, like they’ve been waiting
For me to come along and listen
To write their stories, when all
They would have to do is pick up a pen
They could write their stories themselves
But I am the wishing well
Or maybe the fountain
Into which secrets are cast
Hoping they will come true
Become something
Besides secrets
11. Yeoman’s Work
The flowers were dying
In hot July
And August
I watered
And prayed
But they were dying anyway
What we believe
Does not matter
Only the truth
Matters
The truth is
Sometimes
No matter how much you water
And pray
The flowers die anyway
12. And so it goes
Sometimes I wrote—or read—
To ease the loneliness
But most of the time
It was because
The words wanted out
Letter by letter
Word by word
They clamored
To hit the page and
Exist
I met a girl
A couple of nights ago
Bright as the sun
3 am in the Village
New York, late
In August
I think that’s where I was
Gabrielle Colette
That is her name
And she said,
“The words won’t stop”
She’s a writer too, you see
And the words won’t stop
And we the conduits
Won’t stop
Even though it seems
Sometimes as obsolete
As making wagon wheels
Even though
The world is artificial now
And intelligence is as obsolete
As wagons are
We are here for you, my friends
We craftsmen of the obsolete
And we will let the words
Flow through us
And when nothing else in
This wild world makes sense
Something, something we have written
will
And this ink is the glue
That will hold us all together.
13. In Exile
I am folded forward in half
Hands on my ankles
Stretching, stretching
There is nothing wrong
No tension
Flexible
There is peace
In this exile
Most of the time
I’m not the first or last
Facing displacement
It is part of human history
But the saudade
Lingers in the blood,
In the air when the wind blows
Scents from home
And that memory unfolds
Like a dinner napkin
Lands in your lap
Waiting for the crumbs
Of whatever is on your table
14. The third of September
Everything’s falling
Falling into place
As summer becomes fall
I can’t remember the plans I had
For this season of change
Big plans they were
Self improvement, productivity
I can just watch this damp morning
Pass by, try not to worry
About the foundation of my house crumbling
Hope it will not fall
I just rent here
Not my place to fix it
But I love my old house
And would like it to stay upright
15. Be Kind, Rewind
Would we do it all over again?
Rewind, stop, play
Hear the music,
Watch the credits roll
This is your life
Starring—you
What would be the point
If it was all exactly the same
If there was no way it could be any different
If the screenplay is already written
No room for changes,
Improvisation
Read all your lines again
No retakes, all one continuous shot
The only difference being
You’ve seen it all before
Like Groundhog Day
From 1993
Except you couldn’t change one single thing
Not even one day
And you get to exactly this moment
Forty years after freshman year
Of high school, when Mr. Baldwin
Tried to teach us world history
But we were too busy with hormones
And flirting and crushes
To pay enough attention
To not end up repeating the mistakes
Every other generation made
And so it goes
To be fair, we are still here
Stuck somewhere toward the middle
Or the end. Not ash, not vapor
And so there is a chance
To finish playing the role written
In this your life, our lives
To inhabit our character
Like it matters
Like we are more than
Projected shadows on a screen
16. I am at Hambone
I am at Hambone.
Tom and Irene from The Hague
are playing
With Jared (who is only 13)
and Seth on bass
I sent a clip
Of “One Meatball”
to my folks, and they loved it
Reminded them of my
Grandmother, Georgia, Greek
She liked that song, and what it meant
So many decades ago
And yet it is still being sung
This evening.
Tonight Ray Cashman’s behind the bar
It is Tuesday
In September
Lori and Eric are here
Looking cozy tonight
Mason just arrived
Quicksand has a date
And you never know what might happen
And that’s the thing
The thing that keeps me, and us, going
Bear, Ryan, tall with the hat
Luthier
On Delta Avenue
And fuck, Stan’s out of town
In Sardinia
or maybe Lucca but we get his mail
And feed his cats.
And we miss him, but don’t miss him
We all need to wander
Or at least we all understand the wanderlust
And there is no judgment.
Amana is sitting down by me, so I have to go
She’s all that is young and beautiful
Incarnate, with an old soul
And I love her
Along with this whole scene
Youth does not need worshipping
She’s fine, Youth
What is to worship—
The Oneness
Of this place
Of us
Of Clarksdale, Mississippi
This empty and discarded
Tuesday night
At Hambone.
17. Tune
It is a nice little paper bag
I got myself stuck in
The kind that wine comes in,
And you’ve just discovered drinking alone
Yes, there are a lot of good times
Tucked away in this belly
My body is an accurate reflection of my life
What I’ve gone through,
What I’ve put my body through.
Perhaps one day I will work on
Healing my body as I heal within
But seems unlikely
Time is running out
My gluttony lust greed sloth hedonism
Rooted in my inheritance
This accurate physical reflection of my experiences
On this planet, in this life, who I am
Maybe there is still some beauty, and I can
Try to flourish anyway, despite the binding
Despite being trapped in a prison of my own execution
It might not work, but I can try.
Being lost, being found
Wander far and wide
But all I really want is to
End up on Amanda’s porch
With wine and conversation
I can tune my mind
Like an instrument or radio
Tune in to creativity, words, nature
The Holy Spirit and my Roman counterpart
I am crawling through the mess
I made of my life to get to you
The depth of my loneliness
Matching the depth of my love
Entwined, circling like Mercury’s caduceus, the herald’s wand
Maybe you enjoy the shadows and dark
Because you cannot fear them, being made of light.
They can’t eat you. You shall not be consumed.
Someone wanted to burn me alive
Turn me to ash
Put me in a jar
Put the jar on a shelf
I escaped the fire
And ran for my life
As fast as I could, as hard
The balance true: exactly as good a daughter
As you were a mom, exactly as good a mom
As you were a daughter
You told me no so many times
I thought it was my name
I planted jasmine outside my bedroom window
It almost died in the winter
Somehow it came back
And keeps growing, crawling up the wall
My own faith is not as ambitious today
The seasons exchange
Light for dark
My heart is heavy
Thinking of bare branches
and cold weather
I am here waiting
to measure the sun
And he is in Rome waiting
for the empire to collapse
You’re the dragon
Though I am the one always
Breathing fire and smoke
And so now you’re tired
Passing a few minutes through my head
Floating physically through life
Sinking in the deepest realm within
Trust me, I get tired too
But here I am and here I’ll stay
No way out of the invisible internal ocean
Can only swim
Trust somehow, trust the madness
Dark brilliance, crock of shit
18. This Old Place
Being a writer is not a bad job
I sit on my ass in bed and type
God provides. The words, the money.
Work a few hours, make lunch,
Go swimming, drink wine
It’s Friday in Clarksdale
The expected thing
Is to drink and go hear some music
Maybe.
I tried to be sober
Serious
Dark, cool
Like a cellar
But fuck that
I am a hot old attic
Full of forgotten things
And when you climb
The narrow stairs
To enter me
With both courage and apprehension
You never know
If you’re going to find what you’re looking for
19. A fist down his throat
It was another Sunday night
Sitting outside the hostel in Clarksdale
Virgo time, September
The sun settled behind the trees
And power poles and wires
And all the ugly things
Disappeared
There was magic now
In our elixir we drink
And the blue air we breathe
And all the things we poured into us
Were poured out in laughter
Then he spit on me.
And it wasn’t the first or last time
Slim spit on someone
And his spit landed on my lips
I made eye contact with Mason
Saying help, help me survive this moment
Marc was behind the door
I didn’t want to pay five dollars
To listen to the kid from Nashville
Sing the same songs
When I had just fallen for a
Beautiful blues man from Chicago
That afternoon
But Marc kindly let me in
For free to get a drink
Sarah gave me vodka to purify my lips
Offered to blot them
With a vodka-soaked paper towel
When I told her what had happened
And that was before
the foot fetishist arrived
So we started this poem
To commemorate the moment
Marie said the first line should be
“A fist down his throat
Just to stop the spray of spittle”
But that’s more her style than mine
And her style is both bold and beautiful
Essential in our little jigsaw puzzle we inhabit
All of us pieces of the whole picture
Put together every Sunday night
At the corner, Delta and Second
Although I am okay, and
Sometimes happy,
Amused by the absurd
The question always remains unanswered
Why you let me go
When I so wanted to be held
We had all the pieces then
And could have been whole
Slim didn’t mean to spit on me
He was just speaking his Italian
With exuberance, and he rarely
Speaks to me, and it’s always
An honor when the heroes of legends
Or at least the subject of some good stories
Speak Italian at you.
20. Choose your own adventure
Choose your own adventure, Lis
I did. I regret
All of it—and nothing
Every action has
An equal and opposite
Reaction, one circuit, one electron
Every page I’ve turned to
In this story
Has been solely for your entertainment
Wander through the dial
Frequencies, megahertz
Up, down, tuning in
Dropping out, turning on
I feel you, World, your
Crazy—and make it
My own.
Regret everything and nothing
And until these streets
Run red with blood
I will walk them
I will walk these streets
As if I know
Where I’m bound
Second Street
21. Kiss the sky
I tend to fuck things up
That might be good
In some self sabotage
I can’t seem to stop
It’s not that I’m afraid
Of being happy—I’m happy
Or being loved—I am loved
Or loving—I love
I think you need
Pain receptors to be hurt
And mine have been cauterized,
So it’s not that either.
Why do I want to destroy
What has yet to be created?
There’s an exercise we do
Called “kiss the sky”
And every day is different
The sky is different every day
And maybe that explains it
I am in love with the sky
The clouds in my mind after all
And sculpted clay is only mud
22. October Mourning
Perhaps I’ve soured like old milk
And you’re bitter from pain
But maybe we can find some sweetness
In life again, have a little fun
Taste the honeyed flowers
Of our lotus land
I hope so
I hope we don’t sink
Into oblivion tasting like this
Bitter, soured
Too many hard days
Too many long fruitless years
23. Raised on lies
Raised on lies
The pursuit of happiness
We chase after something
That cannot be attained in movement
Only stillness
Yet the stillness itself is transitory
As are the moments of happiness
What goes down must come up
And so we ride the waves
The energy in constant motion
This is the human experience,
And we fool ourselves into
Thinking happiness is a static
State—that if we try harder
Do more
We can achieve it, and it will
Last forever after
We are not here to pursue happiness
Or even freedom, liberty, justice for all
Sure, it sounds good
But it’s still programming and false
We are here to seek the righteous path
Which always leads to the divine within
We are here to remember
What we chose to forget when we came
To find our way back
To exactly where we started
24. The Stroke of Midnight
Magic doesn’t last forever
The temporary spell
Moonlight, then the rain
There will be a tipping point
Where the erasure happens
Me, from this place
This life
The magic will be gone
and so will I
25. Time to let go?
I’m thinking again
About the news of men
When they talk they tell stories
Plot-driven, action
Fear plagues them, but
Sometimes they try
Really always they try
To overcome their own cowardice
I’m thinking again
About this world of men
The news never new
In its baseness
Tiberius, Caligula
We’ve seen it all before
Employment—that word
“Ploy” fixed inside
Making a living, missing life
I’m crying again
For the love of men
Although I should know better by now
We should all know better
Here I am again
In this world of men
New love
Same old story
When I cry mercy I see
We are the mercy they need
We who are not men
The rocks, the trees, the sun
The sky, water, wind, women
We who are not men
Hold this world together
So you tell me, you who see—
Only the undeserving require mercy
26. Origin Story
Vodka, vermouth, olive, ice
Glass, shaker, and the one who pours the drink
Where did it come from?
Steppes, grasses, herbs, trees
Distilled and barreled, brine—
Sand and lightning, mined and refined
Hammered, forged
And then the one who mixes
All this history, industry, delivery
Through the machination of time, effort
Wheels all turning in alignment
to arrive together one place, one moment
Shaken and poured into this chilled glass
Imbibe, embody
All. Ink, page
Education, experience, observation
Pain—
And born in smoke this comes
The words come in the smoke
Pour out, then drink in,
sober or drunk.
27. The edge of achievement
I cannot make you
Change
Happy
Want
Heal
Finish
Come
I cannot make you do anything
That you must do for yourself
Maybe I can be by your side
behind you guide you inspire you
turn you on tune you in
But you gotta do it baby, you
are the one to decide
Why do we procrastinate
To do the things we really want
deep down or from above to do
Maybe procrastination is the edging
That makes it that much sweeter
When we finally accomplish our purpose
When we finally come
28. Trauma Bond
So here we are in Clarksdale
Where we can’t drink the water
Or breathe the air full of cotton
Houses sinking in the soft earth
Mosquito truck
Mosquitoes
Mildew, mold, lead paint
All these health hazards jeopardizing us daily
And yet—
Propped up on booze and smoke
We stand together
Through this strange shifting time
The rumor is the earth
Is shifting frequencies
Upleveling, the Schumann resonance
Whiting out, off the chart
And that would make sense
The new earth is coming
Jesus is coming
And all the former things
Will pass way
The trump will sound
The dead will be raised
Imperishable
And we will be changed
Hear Handel’s Messiah
The cascading notes singing
The same tune as waterfalls everywhere
For this corruptible
Must put on incorruption
Immortality
So we trauma bond here
In Clarksdale, Mississippi
It will all soon be finished
One way or the other
It is illusion or delusion
Meanwhile the beer is cold
The gossip is good
The weather is cooperating
For another festival weekend
We will listen to some blues
And fall in love a little bit
With something, or someone
And that will be enough
Until the time to come
Changes us in the twinkling
Of an eye.
29. Shack Up Inn, October
And this is where I landed
After a long free fall
Through dark space
This chunk of Highway 49 South
Cotton within view
Celia at my side, talking on the phone
With one of her kids up in Memphis
Libby Rae is setting up to play music
And I hear the tinfoil being unpeeled
From the fried chicken
Erin, Robin, and Steber talking, spinning tales
As intricate as spiderwebs
So I will settle
Into this lawn chair
Ignore the bugs
Be happy
And do you know how
fucking precious that is?
How remarkable in these days?
Earlier this morning I greeted
Two Italian friends
And observed all the beautiful people
From around the world
Who show up, six months later
After our juke joint spring
We’ve all made it this far
Through another part of a year
And for that
We are thankful
And for this
We will endure the coming winter.
30. We lit the smoke
We spent a week together
And a week breaking up
And now it is the third week
I’m trying to remember
How to just be me again
It shouldn’t be difficult,
But it is. I spent years
Figuring myself out
Just to go and fall
Into something again, with
Someone who hasn’t yet.
How good it seemed
To feel again
But I was wrong
We lit the smoke
And burned ourselves down
31. The boy discovers
The boy discovers
The guitar
Like it’s his cock
And then the blues
Like it’s women
And he plays and he plays
Pulling on the strings
Pulling on the strings
That sound
The sky is crying
The sky is crying
And we shall all be washed
In its tears
32. Music is sound organized through time
Is the blues poetry for you?
She asked
When I showed her what I wrote
She is unconvinced about this town
But she liked my poem all right
Then I met another woman
Who understood everything,
All our madness
So that is the fulcrum
Upon which I rest
What is this place?
Is it poetry to me?
I was never much of a fan of poetry
Too pretentious
But here I am
Unconvinced, madness, and understanding
Trying to find the balance
And rhythm that will bring
Order to this time
33. Standing Waves
So I think I figured it out
What’s going on here in Clarksdale
And it has to do with standing waves
Our wave of toxicity
Matches the world’s perfectly
Harmonizing, resonating
Nodes and antinodes
Crests and troughs aligned
Or opposed
And so, like the opera singer
Shattering the glass
With a sustained note
We use this shield of protection
Created by the booze and smoke
Cotton and defoliant and dirt
Dancing through the fall sky
To be safe, and free
From the world’s madness
Our own crazy always
In tune
34. I went to Seville
I went to Seville
And waited in line
And got a drink
And some food
And made conversation
And found a seat
And waited
And waited
And then
The flamenco began
First music
Then dance
And then—a break
So we waited some more
Then a little more
And back they came, the player
The dancer
Because they can’t be on stage
All the time
But when they are
Calling up the Spirit
Life
Worth all the waiting
All the dull minutes
So I am here now in Clarksdale
Listening to the Delta Snakes
The band members are people
With whom I spend suspended moments
Of ordinary time, doing ordinary things
But now—the magic, all original
The music starts, the voice rings out
We are alive, fully alive
Even in a dying world
35. Pain is my master
Pain is my master
The teacher, the only way I will learn
I am a stubborn, rebellious brat
Prone to tantrums
Rage, fits
Dark moods, sulking
Have I learned nothing?
Have I learned nothing?
I have learned, but
Not yet mastered myself
Still wild, still reckless
When I should know by now
Pain hurts
36. I make men hard
Sure they like me to tease them
Get them hard, cocks straining
Like trees, upright
Rooted into earth
They love that
Then this hardness
Reaches through their veins
To petrify their hearts
All my liquid softness
And nonsense
Scaring them to retreat
Behind their walls
The spiked stockade
Built out of dead logs
These hardened hearts
Pierce me, and I dissolve
And all that’s left of them
Is fossilized wood
37. Far Away Eyes
Far Away Eyes—you know that song?
I met her, the girl who can see far away
Into the future
Into the past
But her primary gift
Is to discern this present moment
She is the eight ball
With all the answers
Shake her a little,
Then she’ll tell you the truth
And the truth will rattle you
Down to your bones, deep in your soul
Transparency can be painful
If you’re not ready to reveal
All the skeletons in your closet
All the secrets hiding in your shadows
So unless you are ready, be wary of this girl
Who sees through everything
She doesn’t dress like Apollo’s priestess
But the oracle still exists in disguise
Sometimes as the wind
Sometimes as the barmaid at Red Panther Brewery
38. Punching bag
As we all know
Life is hard
Hard for all of us
And yet some
Some
For some reason
See me
As their punching bag
Is it because
I’m soft and strong
Or weak and hard
I don’t know
All I know is
I am not
I am not your punching bag
You throw your punches
Land your blows
Take it all out on me
And this bag of bones
My broken feet carry
Is sick of your pummeling,
So tired of your abuse
Maybe I should start
Throwing some punches
Fight back
But no, I will
Turn the other cheek
And trust
The only One I do trust
To fight my battles.
He will always win.
39. Gold Bars
I am in the room
Of my past, surrounded
By this collection of memories
Good memories
But still—
Days gone by
And there are a few
More left to live
I made this prison myself
The collection of things
Collection of memories
Thinking that’s what life is
But it is not.
It is not my home
My artwork, photo albums, books
Life is
One step closer
To you
And the path
Becomes clear
40. Peace at the Brewery
There’s a big difference between
Letting go, and letting yourself go
I am great at one, but not the other
I can indulge my hedonism
To the point of injury, brutality
While I hold on, cling
To that which causes my self-destruction
I am picturing a man
With large blue eyes and lots of property
He calls me Lis, and I like that
It is what I call myself
He drinks beer, speaks rarely
Sells things, buys things
Our paths rarely cross
But he comes to mind as one
Who understands that struggle
When to hold on and when to let go
I don’t know, I don’t really know him
His inner world, his heartbreak and pleasures
His blue eyes wide and deep
An ocean within, whose depths I won’t know
Countless shipwrecks filled with treasure
He drinks beer, calls me Lis when he sees me
Watches football, talks softly
Flashes me a smile and a peace sign as he leaves
41. Croce di Malta
We share the same sky, you and I
The same wine, the same time—
Inhabiting this earth in our own spheres
Through all our fears, all the years
Trips around the same damn sun
Isn’t it fun, this game we play
You there, me here—
Alone even in the madding crowd.
Never alone, always as one
Since that first night in the garden
Was there good and evil
Or just midnight, ourselves, and our own light
To blind the shadows
Ekaterina poured me drinks on the roof
And Il Duomo reflected the sunset red
And San Pietro stood golden in the morning
Light and I did all I could
All I could to balance light and shadow
And so it goes
Time erases death, life
Like a broom and Befana
The old witch rides the skies
Clearing clouds and cobwebs
From our minds
And suddenly, suddenly
We just are.
Us.
We just are us.
Same wine, same time.
Same sky.
42. The Monkey Fell
What to say that hasn’t been said
Nothing to get you into bed
Is love well and truly dead
The vampires have all been fed
With worthless thoughts that fill my head
So clouds and mind in secret wed
It is finished, a to zed
Not much hope, nothing to dread
Ergo Virgo ego shed
Whatever’s left after heart has bled
Wondering where this path has led
When all I am is left on read
Delta
43. Delta is the symbol of change
Exposition is overrated
I am a fan of subtlety
But please don’t miss this, dear reader
Each sin we call deadly
Shows its face
Things we never want to face
Ignoring all subtle reminders
One drunken night I fell on mine, my face
And began to see it was time
To get the message
44. Once
Once I wrote the devil looks
Like Rudolph Valentino
But now I think he looks like you
So beautiful and charming
Irresistible
Yet must be resisted, so
he will flee (although flee you did).
Knowing you broke me
In two places at once
Trying to heal, repair the damage
It takes time
And so during this time
I am learning
Things I didn’t want to know
But must learn, must learn
Before it’s all over
And I tried to walk away
Lead me not into temptation
Deliver me from evil
Walked through the valley
Walled in on either side
A dangerous path
That took me down
Lower than my knees,
All the way down
Shadows, death
Fearing evil, my own evil
All the shadows inside
All the death trapped in my own sin,
My own skin
That must be cleansed in blood
Purified by a broken body
Taken at the table
Where differently disguised
Once the devil supped.
45. Lust
You won’t believe this one
Or at least I find it hard to believe
Irony, irony
Mirror, two faces
There we were with some wine
Playing cards by the fire
And something lit
Forbidden. Wrong.
But there it was
So I went outside to smoke
Take control of my thoughts
Pretend I didn’t feel it
Pretend I didn’t hear your sigh
The sound I’ve heard from men before
I can do that, pretend—
I’m an expert at lying to myself
We went on to the party
Drank more wine
Watched the fireworks
Saw the people
Under the church roof
Of the winter sky
Stayed out, drank more
In my stubborn independence I
Decided to walk home, just to get away
Away from you
Then I fell, and you came to my house
Wiped the blood from my face
Took me to bed
And I don’t know if either one of us
Loved it, too drunk, too wrong
But the damage was done
Hopefully we entertained
The heavens watching through the windows
The moon nearly full
And we fools nearly perfect
Perfect in our madness
Lunacy and desire
46. Haiku
I could never see
My own beauty until I
Busted up my face
47. David and Goliath
I am here to do battle
The competition fierce
Against this gargantuan enemy
My self
The flesh, mind, ego
Whatever you want to call it
The part that eats bad tacos late at night
Sleeps with people she shouldn’t
Drinks too much
And all the other bullshit I do
All in the name of Fun
Maybe that is what I have named my false god
Fun
I have served that bitch all my life
“It should be fun”
Maybe
We will see how this story unfolds
The year draws to a close
Sol Invictus, return
I am watching the dawn
This morning, one week before
Cold, cold morning
The sunshine streaming in my window
Thinking about you
All of you, struggling
All of us, in this war
With ourselves and who we’ve let
Master us
Slaves to sin is one way to say it
Hedonism, pleasure-seekers
What are we supposed to seek? Pain?
That’s what we find. Or rather pain finds us
And I am not preaching anything
Just trying to solve this little riddle
We all find ourselves inhabiting
It’s pretty good, really, quite the conundrum
The answer is always Jesus,
I learned that in Sunday School
But it’s still fun to look at the puzzle
Try to find the where the pieces go
Even if he’s on the cover of the box
No, I’m not preaching
And I pray for those I taught
When I knew nothing
I unlearn every day
Knowing less and less
Except that once I thought
I knew everything, we all thought
We knew everything
And acknowledging the error of my ways
Is the first piece of the puzzle
48. And then this happened…
Going up the country, Be sang
Saturday afternoon at Hambone
Football on the TV, Ole Miss and Tulane
The sun was shining
Hot in December, Delta day
Longest night—solstice tomorrow
And we can’t wait, we can’t wait
These long nights have given us
Some good times
We don’t remember clearly
Just that we laughed and danced and sang
But the days are coming
Glory and peace
All this will fade away
The shadows and shame
Sorrow and pain
Madness and misery
All that shit will be gone
Now Be is talking about
Going back to England
To get his favorite sweater
And I think that is poetry
And worth all the money
So then this happens
I meet a writer and traveler
Who is turned around
Pointing the wrong way to New Orleans
We all lose direction every now and then
But it doesn’t matter
It doesn’t matter one bit
We get turned around
But we will find our way
Whatever road we follow
All lead back here, not Rome
Or even New Orleans
But the crossroads
The place where souls are sold
And bought back
Like a pawn shop
Of cosmic redemption
49. The Devil’s Music
I am not pretending
To know the whole history of the blues
Why it got its reputation
What damage it has done
How many folks
Got lost in vice
And various infidelities
At juke joints over the years
The devil runs rampant
Prince of this world
And if you think he lives in some strings
I don’t know what to tell you
Sitting on this corner
Second Street and Delta
World tilted as far as she goes
Watching the Sunday solstice sun go down
Seems holy, music playing
Something sacred in the sound
Honest work, hard work
To transmute despair into song
We are all sinners
And fall short of the glory of God
Why should we hate ourselves too?
Why should we hate each other?
I don’t pretend
To know what right living means
Except this—hatred, wrath
That’s the devil’s music
We are here to learn love
Mitigate the human condition
Whatever way works
Then find our way home
50. The Demon
A long time ago there was a ride
At an amusement park my family often went to
Marriott’s Great America in Santa Clara, CA
It was called The Demon
It was the best ride
The best roller coaster I’ve ever been on
I don’t know how many times I went on it
Or how many demons I’ve picked up
On this ride we are on
I know the little monsters
Take over sometimes
Gluttony and greed, envy and sloth
Wrath, lust, and the queen bitch Pride
These are the seven deadly sins
We’re not really taught about them these days
How to recognize and avoid
Each and every one
We even glamorize some of them
When I fell on my face the other night, it hit me
I can do all sorts of shadow work
Heal core wounds and trauma
Recover from some hard experiences in life
But until I confront my own demons
The ones I’ve picked up along the merry way
Common to all humanity
There will be times I fall flat on my face
And have to get back on my feet somehow
This is what He’s teaching me now
Yes, “God is within her, she shall not fall”
And we won’t, really, even if
We have to pick gravel from our teeth
He won’t let one of his children become truly lost
We sell bits of our soul
To survive this world we’re in
And some parts are stolen
Or crushed
We trade away our own glory
To the system, to the man
To keep the lights on and water running
Hearts get broken, minds wander
And the demons come in
Set up residence
Until we think they’re part of who we are
But the truth is if we believe
We shall not be put to shame
There is work to be done
Not for a paycheck
Reconciliation has already been bought
51. A peace settles over the land
I have no plans to survive myself
I’m gonna use every bit of me up
I’m gonna pour out all the love I can
Into this world during this life
Gonna laugh and sing and cry and hurt
Live until I am no more
“Time itself is the gift” I read somewhere online
There was no source credited
So I give credit to the Source itself
Yes, our time here is the great gift
Flow, Fountain, crash over me, Wave
Subsume me and rebirth me
Washed clean, new
I rise today into the clouds
Like the sun, like the sun
The Wind is my lover
The Sky my best friend
Smoke and page and birds
Tell the story, the channel open
And nothing written shall be unwritten
Let the record play, become the music
Become exactly who you came to be
We are created, and will not be destroyed
52. Appetite of Self-Destruction
More, want, more, want
The idol of our appetite
Consume consume
Consumer, you
Take in all that is offered
All you can buy
Grind the wheel
That never ceases
Milled into flour
Crushed you piece of grain
Scattered to the wind
We’re raised on lies
By the Miller
To serve the machine
The pleasures of our desires
Supposedly enough payment
For our work to feed his avarice
You were flower once,
Before the grain head formed
Before that which could be used
To feed him was harvested
The wheel will not be reversed
The water flows one direction
But this I promise you
As the wind carries you away
Our appetite for sustenance
Is only a lie to eat
We will never be full
Never be satisfied
Until we eat holy bread
53. Stream of Consciousness
So you sold your soul
Not all at once, not at
The midnight crossroads
You didn’t know it was the devil
and you never saw a dotted line
You just woke up one day
and realized it was gone
Traded away day by day
in trips to the grocery store
Some folks don’t miss theirs
content to live without
Owning a soul is a lot of trouble
Maintenance is required
Renting their time seems fine,
and comfortable
Like watching football from the recliner
on a weekend afternoon
But you…you know you
had one, once
It was all you had.
And the riverbed, exposed
Needs water
Needs water to flow
for it to make any sense as a river
So let the clouds gather
Become so heavy
Rain will fall, and won’t stop
This is how to buy back your soul
Let the clouds gather, rain fall, until
there is a flood
The river will return
and bring your soul back with it
54. Envy
I would like something
From my neighbors
But oh God
I so don’t want to covet
It’s just a piece of old furniture
And I might move
Right now I’m listening to the Rolling Stones
Trying not to think of my ex-husband
Who loved the Stones and married a different wife
But I love the Stones too
So I came here, to Clarksdale
To the crossroads
To buy back my soul
Feel its redemption
By Marks, measured
Trying to fit in the old box of religion
But I can’t, I can’t
No matter how pure and good it seems
No matter how many Marks are needed for ransom
Richard the Lion Heart, Eleanor of Aquitaine
My people
So yes I want that old cabinet from
Trish, and Jack and Mason
Without having to ask
My neighbors
Who fed me just yesterday
Christmas dinner
It will look so good in my hallway, this hall
I shall abandon
Offer to me this old piece of wood
So without envy
I can approach the throne
Without envy
Of your pillars and China and grace
I can say
It was not wanted
55. Everything
Everything makes perfect
Sense to me now
Listening to Act One, Introduction
La Traviata by Verdi
Last time I heard this was
Verona. July, four years ago
We were just beginning
And the thing is
Whatever the screens projected
We are ancient
Ancient souls in a modern world
La Traviata, Florence knows
The tragedy of two people
One soul in two bodies
And no, time is not linear
We all know that
But we live and die in these bodies
No matter how many hills are climbed
The restaurant we end up at
Serves only fish
Fuck fish
My pride demands
To reclaim
Claim from you the truth
La Traviata, the tragedy
Of the fallen woman
In this divine comedy
Cosmic joke, cosmic Love
Different music is playing now
Music I don’t like
Music you don’t want to hear
Let’s go back to the stars
Let’s forget all this trouble
I will meet you by the river
The flowing fountain
Whatever language is spoken
I know
You know
Pride is priceless
And overrated
56. Sloth
There is strength
That can’t be measured by gym equipment
Yesterday I was doing something called a slam ball
You lift this heavy ball over your head and slam it to the ground
It doesn’t bounce
You squat down, pick up the ball, and do it again
It felt like us, rising toward ascension
Then slammed down, splat, nothing
Trying again
During the workout, I hear
The demon Sloth screaming
It’s content sitting on the couch
Looking at Facebook
Doesn’t want me to notice it
But Sloth is a tricky bastard
It’s not just bedrotting
It is everything we do as distraction
From our purpose
Being busy as much as lazy
Our time is measured
And the more we waste
The better
57. Gotta remember it’s a joke
Recovering from my face plant—which hurt—
My friends were kind
Telling me their stories of similar incidents
“I’ve got those scars too.”
From falling out of cars, falling in New Orleans
All of us too drunk
The mirror has three faces
You, me, and who I would like to be
I’m too hard on myself, the Spirit says
Relax. Don’t worry. You’ve made it this far
You’ll be all right
My impatience is with myself
This is the hardest sin to face
The consumer
Gluttony
Filling the holes in my heart
With food and drink
Some people try to cook
And you know, we all eat
I can hardly see her anymore
The woman I almost was, who I wanted to become
Pain is expectations not met, someone told me
Maybe so
In New York once, the veil thinned
And I saw it—the cosmic joke
We are only entertainment
Soaked in sin,
bourbon and bitterness
Sharp, sweet, smart, strong
Blues buying back our souls
58. Be Not Afraid
Driving down Second Street
Past burned out houses
Worrying about death, about being burned up
I heard, “If you trust me with your life,
Trust me with your death.”
Well, okay.
It was summer and I was on my way to go swimming
Why wouldn’t I trust him?
So I was confused for a while
Until it became clear it’s different names for the same thing
Sin is missing the mark of perfection
We are all sinners, none of us is perfect
When we come here to life
We will each face challenges
This is what is called our trauma
Then we experience shame
And start to avoid ourselves and God
Attempting to find my way back
Shed the skins I’ve grown
Leave the demons in the dying year
This is a strange and beautiful town, Clarksdale
We went Christmas caroling a few days ago
If one by one you asked who
Professed the Christ,
I’m not sure who would
Have said yes or no
But there we were in nursing homes
Singing our hearts out with
Joy to the World
And I looked at our group
Motley and foolish, earnest and kind
And thought you never know
No matter who
Or how broken we seem to be
You never know
Who is filled with love
Of their fellow humans
Who wants to make a difference
In another’s human heart
I looked around at the people
In these institutions
Those listening and those singing
—sometimes both—
And saw their stories written
“The Son is the radiance of God’s glory
And the exact representation of his being
Sustaining all things by his powerful word.”
A perfect photocopy
Jesus is the Word
The author and perfecter
Through him all things were made
Then he walked into his own story
To the ones he chose to host him
And we like puppies or dumb little twits
Dance around his feet
Making messes but looking cute
Compassion
Mercy, grace
Empathy
Let go of the shame
Let go of the striving
Let go of everything
That is holding on
To keep us from
Being
We live inside God
And only think we are separate
Through folly and ignorance
59. Haiku—Wise words from a father
And this is freedom
You are immortal until
God is done with you.